Fayetteville Parents Want Middle School Plan Decision Delayed

Friday, April 18, 2014

FAYETTEVILLE -- Some parents want the School Board to delay a decision that could send their fifth-graders to a middle school on the opposite side of the city from where they live until other remedies are tried to alleviate crowding at McNair Middle School.

That comment from Angie Maxwell, a political science professor at the University of Arkansas, drew enthusiastic applause from about 75 parents attending the third and final public session on a proposal to distribute fifth-graders between three middle schools in 2015. The proposal will shift Butterfield Trail and Root elementary school students to Holt Middle School when they live closer to McNair.

Meeting Info

Fayetteville School Board

When: 5 p.m. Thursday.

Where: Ray Adams Leadership Center, 1000 Bulldog Blvd.

Source: Staff Report

The meeting Thursday was in the McNair cafeteria. Other meetings this week were at Owl Creek School on Monday and Holt on Tuesday. About 30 parents attended the two previous meetings each night and had fewer comments than those at McNair.

Maxwell, reading prepared comments, asked if the crowding at McNair was a "sustained crisis" that impacts student achievement. She answered the question by stating, "It doesn't."

She continued that all efforts to resolve the crowding at McNair should be exhausted before burdening parents and students with the shift in attendance boundaries. She also said the effort to resolve the crisis should include a long-term plan for a fourth middle school in southeast Fayetteville.

Others in the audience also called a decision by the board as premature and lacked more planning to resolve crowding at McNair even though Holt and Owl Creek were underused.

Robert Maranto, also a University of Arkansas faculty member, suggested a decision should be delayed until a new superintendent is named. A decision now could hamper effort to hire a superintendent who would be coming in with their hands tied.

A committee is recommending moving the dividing line between Holt and McNair schools from College Avenue to Old Wire and Old Missouri roads to better distribute students, especially from Butterfield Trail and Root schools; provide a more even distribution between Holt and McNair; and bring both schools to about an 80 percent capacity until 2023, according to enrollment forecasts.

Students on the east side of the new line would go to McNair, students west of the line to Holt.

The problem is Fayetteville has nine elementary schools, three middle schools and two junior high schools before all students move into Fayetteville High School. The division breaks down at the point when students from the three middle schools are moved to two junior highs, said Jon Gheen, director of the ALLPS alternative center and a committee member.

"A pure feeder system is problematic in Fayetteville," Gheen said. "Moving students from three middle schools to two junior high schools and someone is going to get split."

The majority of the 42-member committee approved the recommendation which next week goes to the School Board as an information item. If no changes or suggestions are made, the board likely will vote at its May meeting. The committee was made up of an administrator, teacher and parent from each of the 14 schools in the district.

An earlier committee recommended the middle level education should be split, with fifth- and sixth-graders in the middle schools and seventh- and eighth-graders in the junior high school. The School Board approved that proposal two years ago but left open a decision on populating the schools.

The new committee was convened in January to take up the enrollment distribution issue and completed their work in late March.

The shifts are planned to coincide when freshmen are moved from the junior high schools to Fayetteville High School in 2015 with the completion of a $95 million renovation of the high school.

NW News on 04/18/2014